Good news and good conclusions

Red letter weekend! Two vaginal deliveries in DAYLIGHT (huzzah!) within the past 24 hours. Both of my patients were lovely, pleasant people, gainfully employed, married, non substance-users, who both had several prior miscarriages. One lady had 2 miscarriages followed by an ectopic pregnancy last year where she had emergency surgery to remove a fallopian tube and hemorrhaged badly enough to need transfusions. The other lady had 1 miscarriage then a pregnancy where the fetus had a series of lethal fetal anomalies/genetic disorders that was not comparable with life and she had this baby at 21 weeks (i.e. it did not survive) a year ago. Needless to say, the relief I felt at the delivery of two perfect, chubby baby girls, was nothing compared to the mother and father's relief. It's great to see deserving people finally be able to have a baby. I love, too, that there was absolutely zero family drama. 

It seems odd to mention drama, but too often, there is >something<. Like, I've had 2 women in labor at the same time and the FOB (father of baby) was the same dude, and both women were pushing within a few hours of each other. Or when the delivery becomes all about the mother/mother-in-law's feelings being hurt when the patient requests that only the FOB to be present for the pushing and delivery. (Hey, it's personal and folks don't want to flash crotch, I can understand that.) Or my super best story is when I had to call security twice  -- once for a FOB + possible other FOB fighting in the hallway, and the second time for FOB + patient's father fighting in the hallway. To be clear, the latter situation involved a 14 year old pregnant patient, a 24 year old FOB, a royally pissed off patient's father, and the police. (It's statutory, you understand. Underage female w/ over 21 man = felony. Just sayin'.) 

My personal life has been reasonably un-dramatic, and I like it that way. Ok, some work stupidity, but that's getting to be routine. Man, do I hate petty people with power silos that negatively impact patient care. Care to venture a guess who deals with the liability? Yup, the folks who have the malpractice policies (the docs whose license is ever at risk). Anyway. I'm getting verklempt just thinking about it.

I'm looking forward to a fabulous conference coming up in Seattle in a few weeks' time. Then I got fantastic news from Heartland Romance Authors that Hell to Pay was a finalist in their Show Me the Spark contest! Cannot help but notice that this Jennifer Hover chick is on the finalist list with me. Again. (Please refer back to my rant about the unlikelihood that I'll win much of anything with her hitting all the finalist lists and doing quite well for some time now. Seriously, kudos for this Hover lady, and I'm certain she's a super nice and talented person. My green-eyed monster needs to go for a walk every so often. Keeps me honest.)

So the month of October should be informative. 3 contest final results should come in later this month. Awesome conference. Awaiting some other news on my series…. We'll see what transpires.

What's even more educational is getting all the feedback from these contests. Some folks love the books and see no issues, some folks shred it to kingdom come, some folks take exception to one style or device, and then some folks don't like that I DIDN'T use more of the same style or device! So what I have realized is, of course, feedback is exceptionally valuable and I have made both Hell to Pay and Dante's Inferno better because of it. But at some point, I have to follow my gut and trust in what's been written. And, as I've learned in the medical field, I really must let go of the fact that there is zero way I will make every person, every reader, every judge happy. And that's ok. That's why there are oodles of books out there from which folks can choose. Doesn't mean to stop improving and pushing the art. Just means that even geniuses (which I am not) have been utterly rejected or had seriously mixed reviews. (Eudora Welty, Steven King, Margaret Mitchell, anyone? I cannot even breathe the same literary air as these folks, but each one faced critical pushback/rejection numerous times before becoming the iconic authors we now know them to be.)

Fingers crossed, we'll see what the next month brings….